*Crash*
Jolly's beady eyes narrowed slightly as yet another crystal window was shattered while the howling wind accompanied by rain filled the room. Behind him stood, Roa, Jenc, and nine other men including Galf. Galf, however, stood in isolation by the corner of the room.
Jenc, meanwhile, gazed at this room.
'So this is the command center of the ship.'
These men were present in the sturdiest house of the community. Other stores and houses are built after the ship is completely designed and built. This meant that the quality of the wood used in creating these stores was not too great. On the other hand, the command center and the port are built into the structure of the ship including the safe house. So, even if the crystal glass meant to decorate and furnish the house was shattered, it did not mean that the house itself was weak.
In the center of Jolly's 'office' was a green orb floating above a map of inscriptions. The runes and the general sense of inscriptions were something Jenc did not know about. Instead, his gaze was focused on the 'steering' orb of the ship.
The community ships, trade ships, and battleships did not need any sail to move or anchor to stop. Everything was powered by these inscriptions. Due to the weather, the room was quite dim but the flashing light of the inscriptions set a somber mood inside.
The other furniture of the office, meanwhile, was nothing aside a small hourglass already smashed away by wind and hail, and a large parchment of a bodacious young woman wearing nothing but a few thicker strips to cover her indecent bits stuck on the left wall.
After a few glances towards the Poster and then the Chief, everybody settled internally and waited for the Chief to take charge.
Jolly still continued to look through the buffet of rain.
"Chieftain, shall we fight? Or should we wait? The men of the ocean still await. If retreat is the option, why are we here? If there's a mischief, quickly dictate," Galf's hollow chuckled echoed. His voice too low, and almost similar to a growl but it was his sense of speech that filled others with dread.
"Fucking creep," Nhil shivered. She was a petite young woman in her late twenties and stood next to a middle-aged voluptuous woman— Dhira, and a burly man with extremely short hair and pronounced jaws— Vitski.
These three are the Instructors of the community and would continuously raise and educate young men and women for free. They had other jobs, too, but it was simply an extension of their free work. For instance, Vitski would teach combat lessons but in the evening, he would also hold private combat tuitions. Similar were Nhil and Dhira. In fact, the three had already collaborated on tuitions and developed a timetable to resolve conflict in the time of their lectures.
"The losses of the stores can be mitigated with the number of sea organisms slowly filling the deck due to the rain. I will need four of you to collect all these sea animals and with Roa, you will make a list. We will divide this based on the total taxes these store owners and fishers have paid in the last five years," Jolly began. This would be a perfect blow to the tax evaders of the ship and encourage others to not skip out on meager payments to the ship.
"But, the remaining six to take care of some trouble sea animals around the ship. They are approaching fast. One of them is a projector sea beast. Galf will support me on that one. We won't change the course of the ship without a solid reason. The last thing I want in this storm is a bunch of bureaucrats distracting me at the most sensitive moment. Of course, I will file your contribution to the Ark and request rewards for all eleven of you."
Jolly didn't move a single inch but almost everyone, including Roa, had their eyes light up in joy.
The Community Ship is, in reality, a property of the Ark and any chief of the Community is an employee of the Ark. Of course, Jolly had the power to send requests for rewards, and back-up, but he also has to deal with setting the account of the Community, keep in contact with the Ark, update the payments of taxes to the vault and stuff like this.
"Let's see... Jenc, Dhir, Vitski, Nhil will take care of clearing the deck and the port. Roa, I want a clear list and I won't repeat myself again."
In fact, acquiring the resources was a more important task. Jolly specially picked the four because, despite their strength, they still did not gain any massive fortune or coincidental connections to purchase a spatial ring. Men like Trilok are rare, and even his business only became top-tier after the introduction of Spirit Trace Oil.
On the other hand, the remaining six cultivators were the top blacksmiths and Inscriptionist of the community and of course, they had their storage rings by now. Jolly wasn't willing to risk these looters to diminish the returns of the ship by privately storing rare sea creatures!
The plan was set and all they needed to do was wait for Jolly's command to move out.
---
Trilok closed the door behind him with an amused smile. He truly wasn't the one to share stuff for free so he decided to let Vayu have his moment while making plans to drain Kol dry until she turned into a thin woman full of hope and life once again.
Unlike the usual brown wooden floor, the hall of the safe house was built into the ship directly and the walls and flooring proclaimed a reddish tint to its grain pattern. Wood has always been a widely used resource in the construction of furniture and metallic battleships are quite rare. Of course, finding a good sea forest is an extremely daunting task and one of the reasons why the investment in the purchase of individual ships is off the charts.
Since Trilok had the idea of developing his own team of fishers, he had begun to look into all the expenditure needed to achieve this goal. However, he was still in the research phase and wasn't eager to spend all his savings on a ragtag opportunity filled with holes that would sink into the ocean easily.
The ship would sway every now and then, which made Trilok eagerly clench the railing crafted on the opposite wall since the other side had rooms built-in and would disrupt a single railing multiple times.
The only source of lighting was the sparsely spaced lamps built on the higher edge of the wall with a single tube connecting them collectively and providing a stable supply of oil. Still, the flickering flames barely provided any stable source of light and allowed Trilok to slowly make his way to the edge of the hall. The safe house wasn't built in the shape of a house. Instead, it was divided into floors with a number of rooms and toilets.
A total of three floors and 285 rooms with 95 on each floor. Meanwhile, the total number of toilets constructed was 10. Still, after years of establishment, this number was clearly subjected to suffocation since every room was occupied by at least 3 individuals. And this was the situation of the lucky men and women!
As he reached the edge of the floor, one of the locked restrooms was opened and a brown-haired woman walked out. She had a slightly pretty face and she wore her shoulder-lengthed hair into a braid. The woman flinched when she saw someone but after a moment's observation and a silent curse to the extremely low light setting of the floor, the woman recognized Trilok and sighed softly.
"It's a pleasant coincidence meeting you here, Trilok," the woman smiled as confidence glimmered in her eyes. However, she closed the door behind her quickly.
"Miss Nelly," Trilok nodded and smiled, "I assure you, this definitely is a coincidence."
The woman chuckled at Trilok's remark, "I shouldn't take too much of your time but I hope that we can talk about our venture sometime soon."
Her words made the corner of Trilok's eyes twitch slightly but he nodded with a smile and let Nelly leave. Instead of choosing the restroom which had been defiled just now, Trilok entered another toilet and frowned.
'She wants to enter the venture? Wait... this seems like a personal opinion. If she would have discussed this with Roa then he would have explicitly kept this addition a secret.'
Trilok pulled his shorts down and crouched over the toilet but instead of focusing on his personal business, his mind was pulled towards the words Nelly proclaimed.
'Nelly has just broken into rank 7 Spiritual Enhancement. This means, she has active combat ability aside from martial skills and spiritual skills. Her pregnancy, of course, became a bonding catalyst for Roa and herself. However, it seems quite an exaggeration that Roa would let her in on his foundation. Even the Chief was kept away and his other partners previously. Although, he might have to break it off with other girls... but this is just a gloating point. And if Roa does allow Nelly to enter the venture, who's to say she wouldn't want to snatch more profit now that she couldn't go out to the ocean anytime soon.'
Although Trilok had never met Nelly previously, after she got pregnant with Roa, many of her slightly overlooked achievements resurfaced once again. However, when the sun shines, shadows are cast.
While many praised the achievements, even more, were the unhappy population who threw dirt to Nelly's reputation with the most prominent ball of dirt being that Nelly would sometimes take her subordinate's credits and rewards. The fact that not many from her fishing team did not deny this fact seemed to ambiguously approve of this particular rumor.
Sighing slightly, Trilok couldn't help but lament. If Nelly truly was as unreasonable as rumored, then his profitable venture with Roa might come to an end soon enough.
'I don't know if Chief Jolly shared his Cultivation Technique with his wives but Roa still hadn't shared the [Below of Wine Monk] and [Drunk Shura] with Nelly.
Still, aside from the Chief's family who has a High-Mystic body Cultivation Technique, only Jenc holds a High-Exotic one. So... gradually, Jenc will gain a significant footing in the community and if he finds a stable business, he might even get an entry to the management circle of the ship if he isn't already a part of it.'
Trilok had his eyes set on this particular goal and one of his competitors might be Jenc. In fact, this competition wouldn't be caused by business reasons but rather personal ones.
---
*Crackle*
*Ghrrrrsshhhh*
The sound of crackling thunder and the heavy downpour overpowered the splashes caused by five shadows moving through the deck. Their footing was stable despite the tilts of the ship due to forceful, crashing waves. All of them wore thin, hooded cloaks over their clothes and rushed towards the port.
*Crash*
The ship was forced to tilt leftward as a humongous wave crashed in from the right. The five figures instantly stopped as accompanying the flood was a large number of sea creatures.
"That's..."
The shortest figure gasped.
Washed over by the wave was no school of fishes flapping in despair or gnawing away at the hard wooden deck with their extremely sharp teeth. Instead, it was a giant crab that had its body supported in the air by a long set of sharp legs. The dark green pair of 3 legs themselves were almost 2 meters in length, which made the crab look amazingly tall. Instead of a regular set of fixed fingers and movable fingers at the two frontal claws, the thick-shelled crab held four fingers shaped like a blooming flower with their end connected to a ball-bearing organ covered with a thick shell. Its eyes were protruding and were connected to two sets of erect muscles, making the visual organs detached from the shelled body.
"A Frantic Crab!" The tall figure removed his hood and hissed in excitement.
The person even pulled away the eye patch over his left eye.
"Jenc, you'll be fine taking this guy alone?" Another hooded figure inquired in a deep tone.
"Of course. Last I checked, the rules were simple. Each of us gets to have dibs on five beasts. And if I kill it, nobody can call dibs on it besides for myself, right?" Jenc inquired with a smile.
"That's right. The rules of dibs are not to be obstructed," The same figure replied.
"Give me a minute then," Jenc stepped forward instantly while the long eyes of the Frantic Crab instantly fell on Jenc.
*Click* *Clack*
*Clickity Clack*
The crab instantly moved sideways while tapping its legs loudly and waiting for the opponent's move.
"Frantic Crabs are frivolous and challenge their opponents to a battle of movement. If Jenc doesn't match the rhythm of its movement, the Crab will attack," The figure that replied to Jenc previously— Roa— looked at the new speaker. The remaining male of the group. Well, until he gets his injuries in order.
Vitski's words made Nhil and Dhira nod silently.
"Maybe Jenc really found a Body Cultivation treasure... he looks too confident," Nhil whispered.
"It's got nothing to do with us. Spiritual Cultivation already drains most of our resources, much less Body Cultivation," Dhira smiled.
While the crab waited silently, Jenc broke the formless rhythm and stepped forward instead of sideways. Instantly, the four-fingered claws of the crab began rotating as they slowly picked pace.
Saws made out of hardened claws!
The tiny mouth of the crab visible due to the height difference instantly let out a high-pitched screech and the sound of high-paced rotating claws cutting through rain echoed in Jenc's senses.
Still, Jenc moved forward without an ounce of fear. He wasn't simply confident. He was cautious, too. If now, why would he remove his eyepatch?
Jenc's nails hardened under the glow of spiritual energy and they grew sturdier until a cold light reflected from those ten nails.
'His enhancement works well with body cultivation. No doubt father favors the man,' Roa narrowed his gaze.
*Eeeeennngggg*
The sound of claws acting as sharp saws echoed and the crab struck forward with anger in its very vulnerable set of eyes.
'And there's his spirit skill, Strong Body...' Roa noted while Jenc's body remaining still and grew in size a little further.
"Is he..."
"Yeah, he's taking it on."
*Clash*
An extremely jarring sound echoed as Jenc expertly tilted his body and pushed his hand into the saws just enough to press his nails within and instantly, the left saw came to a stunning stop, in fact, Jenc's nails had broken through the finger of the claw.
This is the only indication the spirit beast needed to retreat back into the sea and grow Frantic elsewhere but Jenc suddenly jumped onto the large claw and propelled himself towards the eyes of the crab.
"Your eyes are the only thing worthless about you!" Jenc gave a cold smile before he punctured through the eyes without flinching and dug his hand within the opening of the eyes to stab into the Crab's central system. The swaying body of the crab collapsed instantly while Roa walked forward and touched the carcass. Instantly, the body disappeared while Jenc smiled.
"Heeee~ You're so lucky. Frantic Crabs make one of the best dishes that have the ability to optimize body," Nhil snickered while Jenc gave an easygoing smile.
"It isn't luck if you waste blood and sweat to get strength, right?"
"You mean... the blood of kids?" Dhira chuckled while Jenc sighed deeply.
One mistake.
It took one mistake which was fueled by anger and indignance.
Had he controlled himself and simply punched Trilok twice, nothing would have changed but now...
'I'm the guy who doesn't understand the generation gap... who brutalizes young men and women for material gain.'
Of course, this was merely a small red cross to his reputation and in the end, that was just it. He would be subjected to mockery by his peers but his situation didn't change much. So, Jenc had learned to turn a blind eye towards the consequence of this particular action, quite 'literally.'
Adjusting his patch once again, the group moved.
They had the task of continuously clearing and storing every spirit creature they come across that is rare in the dweller stage or within the enhancement stage.
